about problems faced by decision makers

1. DECISION PROCESS PROBLEMS
Arun P
Jayakrishnan S R
Muhammed Faiz A P
Rahul Thakur

2. ►Each and every day we are faced with a multitude of
decisions.
►Some of these are relatively small, others are big and can
have a major influence on the course of our life.
►Some decisions take time while others must be made in a
split-second.

3. ►While we employ a number of different decision-making
strategies, we also often fall prey to a number of common
fallacies, biases, and other decision-making errors like:
1)Heuristics(Sort of Mental Shortcut)
2)Overconfidence(Overestimate our own knowledge,
skill or judgement)
3)Hindsight Bias(Look back on same)
4)Illusory Correlation

4. What makes decision-making effective lies mostly in the initial
context setting before even entering into the decision-making
discussion.
More we educate participants in the decision-making process, the
more cooperative they end up being with one another during the
discussion.

6. People not clear about their level of decision-making
authority regarding the decision.
This leaves participants unsure as to how committed they
should be in the decision-making process.
1.
Remedy:
Determine and express up front their level of decision-making authority. They
need to know where they fall on the continuum of empowerment. Let them
know up front what will happen with their decision(s), which:
• may or may not be used as input/feedback by management in making a final
decision.
• most likely will be accepted by management who reserves the right to have
the group tweak areas of concern.
• will be accepted as the final decision.

7. The wrong or inappropriate people are sitting at the
table.
2.
Remedy:
At times I have facilitated meetings where the key stakeholders have sent
directs or representatives in their place. This makes for a
difficult discussion as the key people who will own the decision are not present.
The likelihood of the follow-through by these missing people is negligible – to
say the least.

8. People lack the right information to engage in thorough
discussion of the decision options.3.
Remedy:
Ensure information that will place all participants on the same page is
distributed before the session for their perusal. Ensure they understand the
implications of having not read the information.
This means that those more informed may sway others; everyone will have to
live with the results; more knowledge of decision options is equal to better
quality decision, etc.

9. People walk into the decision-making meeting already
biased on a position (personal agenda).4.
Remedy:
Ensure information that will place all participants on the same page is
distributed before the session for their perusal. Ensure they understand the
implications of having not read the information.
This means that those more informed may sway others; everyone will have to
live with the results; more knowledge of decision options is equal to better
quality decision, etc.

10. 5.Unclear ‘criteria’ for determining
the best decision.
Remedy:
Quite often, especially during priority setting, we have the
group determine key criteria to rank priorities against.
Ensure that the group engages in a good debate as to
what makes some criteria more important than others. It’s
important that the criteria chosen supports and falls within
the organizational strategy as well as the group’s
particular needs. Test all participants’ knowledge of what
the criteria means. Before ranking items against the
criteria, ensure the group discusses thoroughly how each
possible decision meets or fails the criteria.

11. 6. Lack of sufficient time for a
comprehensive discussion
Remedy:
It’s quite evident that as you increase certain factors in a
decision-making process, more time will be required to
build a consensus. These factors typically include:
the number of people involved in the discussion the
complexity of the decision the degree of agreement
required by all the degree of impact the decision will have
on everyone (and beyond this group)
Therefore, trying to facilitate a decision that is highly
impactful and complex in 1.5 hours with 18 people is
probably a recipe for failure. Now, don’t get me wrong,
you might arrive at a decision, but I question its quality.

12. 7. The facilitator rarely asks for feedback from the
group in terms of how well the process is working
Remedy:
During any decision-making discussion the facilitator is
responsible for checking the type P’s. These are:
1. Purpose: “are we on purpose here? Are we on target
with our discussion?
2. Process: “are these discussion steps/tools effective in
helping us reach our goal?”
3. Pace: “are we moving fast enough?
4. Pulse: “are people still alive?”
5. Progress: ” are people seeing us making movement?”

13. THANK YOU!